Weddingbee Blog

They’re here!!!!!

I am overly excited about these proofs, and maybe I’m biased (of course I am biased), but I think these look fantastic!

I added in “Together with their families” for a purely aesthetic reason. My first proof didn’t have anything before my name and it looked a bit….empty. So I filled it.

This is the seal that will go on the outside of the pocketfold. I know usually people put the recipient’s names here, but I’m done being a DIY bride, so the seal will have our names and the date on it. This way, no one can get confused about the date, especially if they don’t read English very well.

Finally, the RSVP cards. I know Miss Daisy wrote about this yesterday and I wanted to put in my two cents about RSVP cards.

Yes, some people do assume that they can bring children.
Yes, some people do assume that they can bring dates.
Yes, some people do assume that they can bring anyone who is not on the actual invitation.

So what am I doing about it?

You see where it says “_____ of _____ will attend”? I am going to fill in the second ____ with the actual number of people that are invited to the wedding.

Do you think it’s a bit…..rude? But I think it’s ruder to bring uninvited guests to a wedding, when wedding costs are sky high.

Ice! In the shape of diamonds! How did I live so long without you?

$9.10 from Firebox.

(Via boingboing.net)

In today’s beehive, Amber is looking for affordable places to buy paper and envelopes for invites, Lynn wants to know whether or not to invite her future brother-in-law and his wife who she and her FH had a falling out with, and yeh-eun is looking for an affordable NYC florist that offers free delivery.

Please add your question to the beehive!

Mrs. Bee and I are here out in LA visiting her family (aka my in-laws).

I talked with her dad earlier this year about calling him “Dad”, but I haven’t done it yet this trip (OK, ever). I am sure it will pop out some time naturally. But so far, it has been great to spend time with Papa Bee and Mama Bee. I got really lucky: I like my in-laws a lot, and enjoy visiting LA and spending time with Bee’s fam.

The hardest part of the trip actually has been Mrs. Bee’s blogger’s block. We are sitting in a Starbucks in Rowland Heights CA (paying $10 a day for wifi!!!), and Bee hasn’t been able to get in a groove. We came out to California for my business trip, so I must apologize to Weddingbee readers for the reduced bloggage!

Anyway on the subject of in-laws, I think parents/in-laws are one of the single biggest factors in wedding stress. If you get along with them, than wedding planning is tough but doable. But if you don’t, then wedding planning can explode into something horrifically stressful.

Are your in-laws affecting your wedding planning?

I made cry packs - glassine envelopes filled with tissues - for our guests’ “tears of joy.” I don’t know if anyone actually cried tears of joy, but people thought it was cute and it was a really easy DIY.

If you’d like to pass out tissues at your wedding the easy way, check out Sniffs’ wedding themed tissues for $1.45/pack.

I need help finding a original song (or as original as can be) for a good garter toss song. Any ideas would be helpful!!!

Tom

1. The Bar is a distant memory — I got to cut off my bright green plastic security bracelet yesterday, and the cramp that developed around around hour 4 of the essay portion and turned my hand into a claw is starting to ease up a little. Official proof that the exam is over! Thank you for all your good wishes!

2. Look at these!

Cherry blossom branches made from natural plant materials that aren’t cherry blossoms. I think they’d make an amazing display. From Sprout Home.

Shutterfly is hosting a wedding photo contest!

Submit your amateur photo to win one of three Shutterfly product prizes by August 15th. But you don’t have to enter to vote on the entries!

(Thanks Aya!)

Mr. Bee and I are still in LA at my parents’ un-airconditioned house (their ac is broken and every air conditioner/fan in southern california is sold out due to an insane heat wave). I was experiencing extreme blogger’s block yesterday because I’m away from my usual desk, and I’m finding it hard to get into extreme blogging mode (plus it’s hot, hot, hot). So I went to Barnes & Noble yesterday and picked up some travel magazines for inspiration, because I thought we’d increase our coverage of honeymoon and destination wedding locales.

When my brother came over for dinner later that evening, he perused through one of my magazines and saw a bridge in Firenze, Italy he and his wife visited last year. That’s when we began tossing around the idea of brotherbee - weddingbee’s special honeymoon correspondent.

My brother and his wife love to travel - some of you may remember his three part series on Bora Bora. Together they’ve been to Korea, Canada, Italy, France, UK, Thailand, Guam and more in the past two years. Brotherbee loves to frequent travel sites like tripadvisor where he reviews places he’s been, so he was excited about the idea of being a travel correspondent for weddingbee. Honeymoon arrangements are also one detail we often leave up to the hubbies, so I thought it might be interesting to have a male perspective. Mr. Bee even showed him his overall-clad character, and my brother requested a cool bee character - one with sunglasses.

Why did they travel so much? My brother’s wife is Korean, and was denied a tourist visa to the United States when they were dating. So the pair travelled to some of the world’s most romantic destinations just to be able to see each other. Of course now they’re happily married and living in Southern California, but they still love to travel. Most recently they took a trip up the central coast of California and to the Grand Canyon.

What do you think about beefing up our honeymoon coverage? What destinations are you most interested in?

Pamela Anderson has reportedly asked Kid Rock’s ex-lover, Jimmy Choo designer Tamara Mellon, to be a bridesmaid in their wedding.

(image via VH1)

Are you planning on inviting an ex to your wedding? Would you be ok with your fiance inviting an ex?

I had the hardest time figuring out what to buy Mr. Firefly as a wedding gift. My parents already bought him a Cartier Tank Francaise watch as an engagement present (he called it his “installment plan,” ;)) and although I bought him gorgeous cufflinks from Links of London, I knew that he wouldn’t get any real pleasure out of them, so I couldn’t make it his gift.

I wound up buying him a completely useless — but sentimental — gift. Our first date was drinks at the now-closed Chango on Central Park South. There were these little plastic monkeys on the bar that I couldn’t stop playing with. When we returned to Chango on our first anniversary, we took home a handful of these little monkeys.

Tiffany’s has a silver straw with a very similar little monkey… I just had to buy it! I put one of the plastic monkeys in the Tiffany’s bow and wrote “I’ve known since then” in the card. Not the most useful of gifts, but I couldn’t resist.

What did Mr. Firefly get me? Well, he’s still working on it. It’s supposed to be something extra special. I ask him for clues all the time… but he’s been tight lipped.

Ok, so I have perused the boards on the Knot and WeddingChannel a few times and keep reading about people who send out response cards, and have them sent back with an affirmative reply for the invitee AND also include a “yes” on behalf of people who are *not* invited to the wedding. The thing is–I cannot believe* this happens.

I know I have, a few times in the past, been somewhat bummed to have been invited to a wedding sans guest, but it never once occurred to me to RSVP and respond that I, and a guest, would be attending. I mean…

Because I have been a bridesmaid a few times, looked on as many a good friend planned a wedding, and never once did I hear of someone RSVP’ing and saying that they were bringing a person (or child) not on the invitation envelope.

With that said, I am inviting every single person to my wedding with a guest. I realize it’s expensive, and not an option for everyone, but one thing Mr. Daisy and I always bore in mind was that we wanted to do this. This is not to besmirch anyone who doesn’t invite all peeps with a “+ 1″– weddings are f’n expensive and this simply cannot always be done. My reasons for doing it are mostly because– having spent the majority of my twenties sans serious boyfriend– I know from experience how much I sometimes resented having someone else determine for me whether my relationship (nascent or longstanding) merited that “and guest” designation or not. (Does this make me bitter? Perhaps, un peu…)

Of course, there are a few couples on our list that have children who will *not* be invited to our wedding but I don’t really see them trying to RSVP for the little ones, I’m really just trying to figure out if it’s actually possible that *anyone* would think it ok to bring someone despite the absence of their name (or “and guest”) from the invite.

Ladies? i know you must have thoughts on this one!

~~~

* ok, intellectually I get that it *can* happen, but who does this?!?

I’m thinking of ordering Mr. Firefly one of these custom comics by Mark Weber, whose work has run in The New York Times, The Village Voice, Rolling Stone, and Playboy. The comics are frameable six-panel hand-drawn 8×11 art on 11×14 acid-free paper. Black and white is $150 and full color is $225. I think it would make a wonderful wedding gift for your fiance or even another couple you know.

… I wish I had found this before we got married!

Source: http://www.theknot.com/ NYC message boards.

This is an interesting article about why a man decided to take his wife’s last name when they married.

Beginning around the 1960s, more women were choosing to keep their maiden names or hyphenate their names after marriage.

The number of women choosing to retain their maiden name dipped in the mid-1990s. TheKnot.com reported in 2004 that 81 percent of women planned to assume the last names of their husbands.

I still haven’t changed my last name due to sheer laziness, but I do plan on doing it… some day… soon.

Uniquity Invitations offers invitation templates you purchase online then print yourself. Invitation templates are $25, entire collections are $40, and color changes are extra.

These are examples of embellishments customers added to invitations - from ribbon, to envelopes, to colored backing.

This looks like an easy and affordable way to create diy invitations!

(via diybride)